Sniper
by Alfonso Ling
Summary: Think a gun-free Japan is too boring? Maybe a sniper would liven things up.


**Disclaimer: I don't own "The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya" or any of its characters and I am not profiting in any way from this story. It is posted here for entertainment purposes only.**

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"I wonder if Japan would be a more interesting place if there were more guns. Did you know that compared to the United States, our gun crime rate is pretty much zero?" Haruhi clicked to the next page in the article. "But in Switzerland everyone has a gun and the gun crime rate there is almost the same as it is here. What's up with that?"

"Hey Haruhi," I asked. "What's with you and guns all of a sudden? Isn't it a good thing people aren't getting shot up all over the place like they are in the States?"

"Of course that's a good thing. That doesn't mean I can't be curious about it, right?"

"What got you thinking about this all of a sudden? It really seems like a pretty dark topic if you ask me."

"Kill Bill. The movie. It's pretty wild. I just watched it the other day on Netflix." Haruhi did some typing followed by a few mouse clicks. "Here's the IMDB on it. The main girl in the movie is played by Uma Thurman." Haruhi flashed a wicked smile. "She is so good!"

"What do you mean by _good_?" I asked. "A good cook? Good with kids? Good looking?"

"No. Good with a samurai sword. She really slices and dices it up in this movie. There's arms, legs and heads everywhere! I've never seen so much blood!"

"Ewwwww! Gross!" Miss Asahina covered her eyes.

"Seriously, Haruhi," I said. "How can you watch something like that? And how in the world did that get you started on guns?"

"There weren't any guns in the movie. Uma Thurman kills about a hundred guys with her samurai sword at this restaurant and nobody thinks to shoot her. You'd think after maybe fifty corpses on the ground someone would come up with that idea. But nobody did."

I shook my head. "It's just a movie."

"I remember quite well when that sniper was terrorizing Washington, D.C.," Koizumi said. "It was a very scary time. This man and his accomplice killed ten random people over a three week period. I was only six years old at the time and I was afraid to leave my house."

"That doesn't make any sense," Haruhi said. "The guy was all the way over in Washington, D.C. That's thousands of miles away from here."

Koizumi shrugged. "I was only six. I thought it was very scary."

"What is up with everybody? How did we get off on this morbid topic? Guns, samurai swords, snipers."

"I think it would be cool to have a sniper in Japan," Haruhi said.

"WHAT?" Koizumi, Miss Asahina and I all said this at exactly the same time. Even Nagato looked up from her book.

"I'm serious," Haruhi said. "But instead of killing innocent people, maybe this guy can kill bad guys. Remember a few years back when that guy had the Death Note? He'd write the bad guy's name in this notebook and they'd die of a heart attack within minutes."

"Things didn't end too well for that guy as I remember," Koizumi said. "Didn't detective L catch him? I believe his full name was Light."

"Do I have to remind everyone that was just a manga?" I said.

"They made a very entertaining movie out of that concept as well." Koizumi smiled.

"Can we please just drop the subject? All this talk about killing, it's really starting to freak me out." I got up, grabbed my backpack, and walked toward the door. "I'm getting out of here! See you all tomorrow."

"Hey Kyon. Want to go for a run?" Haruhi asked before I could step into the hallway. "Taking a break from this club room sounds like a good idea."

"Sure," I said. It seemed like a great idea. I could use the exercise.

"I got my gym clothes right here." Haruhi pointed to a bag on the floor. "I'll be out in a minute." As she started unbuttoning her blouse, Koizumi rushed toward the door. I ran down to the always empty Bird Watcher's clubroom started changing in there.

I just finished pulling up my shorts when an athletically dressed Haruhi Suzumiya burst through the door. "Ready yet?"

"Let's go," I said.

When we got to the high school track, the track team was using it so we decided to run around to the soccer fields at the other side of the school instead.

"I measured it," Haruhi said when we got there. "If we run around these six light posts it's almost exactly the same distance as one lap around the track. And you know what? It's better for your legs if you run on a natural surface like grass."

"Great!" I managed to say between breaths as I struggled to keep up with Haruhi.

"zzzzzzzip" I heard something whizz past my right ear. I thought it was a bug. Then I heard a "pop" in the distance very shortly after. I turned to see where the pop noise was coming from. I noticed a white van sitting alone in the parking lot way off in the distance about a half a mile to a mile away. The back doors of the van were open.

I saw a quick bright flash. It lit up the dark interior of the van for a split second. I stopped dead in my tracks. "zzzzzzzzzzip" Another bug seemed to pass right in front of my nose. Then a "pop".

"Hey! What's up?" Haruhi noticed I was no longer next to her so she turned to see where her running companion had gone.

"HARUHI! WE NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE! IT'S A SNIPER!"

"Come on Kyon. Stop fooling around!" Haruhi put her hands on her hips. "Japan doesn't get those, remember?"

Another flash - and a hole appeared in Haruhi's t-shirt right under her armpit. "pop"

Haruhi noticed the gentle tug on her t-shirt. When she looked down and saw the hole, her face turned pale.

I looked around. "The light pole! Get behind the light pole!"

Haruhi and I took off for the only cover we could.

"pop pop pop pop pop" I could see several flashes out of the corner of my eye. Dirt kicked up around us where the bullets hit the ground. Fortunately it's next to impossible to hit a moving target from that distance and we made it to the post safely.

The soccer field's lighting system was state of the art. Its massive flood lights were mounted forty feet above the ground. Six huge lamp posts were all that was needed for full coverage of three side by side soccer fields. I mention this because this fact may have helped save our lives. The light post we were hiding behind was about three feet in diameter.

I grabbed Haruhi tightly around the waist and pushed her back up against the solid metal post. I was pretty sure we were safe - for now.

"CLANK!" A bullet crashed into opposite side of the post.

"He can't get to us now."

"Kyon. What's going on?"

"A sniper. He's shooting out of the back of a white van in the parking lot back there."

"Why is he shooting at us? We're not evil!"

"How should I know?" I said. I continued holding Haruhi up against the post. Haruhi put her arms around me and held me tight in return. When I peeked around her for a split second, I saw another flash.

"CLANK!" "pop"

"What's that pop sound?" Haruhi asked.

"It's the gunshot. The bullet gets here before the sound of the gun because it's supersonic - bullets travel faster than sound. Excuse me for a second." I let Haruhi go and took off my t-shirt.

"Are you sure you want to do this right now?" Haruhi said as she grasped the bottom of her shirt. "The police might still come and rescue us." She lifted up her arms pulling her t-shirt up towards her bra.

"Stop that!" I smacked Haruhi's hands away from her shirt. "I'm using my t-shirt as a decoy."

Haruhi frowned. "Oh, okay."

I rolled up my shirt and held the end out to the side. "WHOOOSH!" "pop" The shirt got shot right out of my hand.

"Need another shirt?" Haruhi asked.

"No, I'm good."

"What are we gonna do, Kyon?"

"We could wait him out. When it gets dark enough we could make a break for it. But there's a good chance he might shoot the next person that comes by here. We really need to stop him."

"How can we do that?" Haruhi asked. "We don't have any guns."

"In the old days, when an army platoon ran into a sniper, they didn't mess around. They called in air support."

Haruhi looked up into the sky. She pointed to a barely visible vapor trail thousands of feet up above a break in the clouds. "There's a plane up there." She looked back toward me. "Hey, are you sure you don't need another t-shirt? I don't mind."

"CLANK!" "pop" Another bullet hit the post.

"That's okay. Don't need it. He's still out there."

"Okay, just wanted to help." Haruhi crossed her arms across her chest. "Darn. This really sucks. I wish we had air support!"

Then I had an idea. "You know Haruhi, there is something you could do. This will sound weird, but I think it will work. Trust me."

Haruhi shrugged. "Okay."

"Point up to the plane and imagine one of it's engines falling off - just one. Then point really fast at that van and say 'BOOM!'"

Haruhi put her hands on her hips. "Come on Kyon! Stop kidding around!"

"zzzzzzip" "pop" A bullet grazed Haruhi's shirt. She quickly pulled in her arms.

"I'll kiss you if you do it," I said.

Haruhi smiled. "For real?"

"Uh-huh."

Haruhi nodded her head. "Okay. Deal." She pointed up towards the vapor trail. It took a couple seconds but a tiny spark up in the sky told me something happened. Then Haruhi turned and hugged the post. I held her from behind. She peeked out from behind the post and pointed at the white van. "BOOM!" she said while extending her index finger. I pulled her back as soon as I saw another muzzle flash. "CLANK!" "pop"

Haruhi turned back toward me. "Okay, I did it. Now pay up."

"Right now?" I asked. "This could be good."

"What could be good?"

"Oh. Never mind." I pulled Haruhi close and moved my face towards hers. We closed our eyes as our lips touched.

"BAABOOOOOMMMM!" A loud fiery explosion rocked the parking lot in the distance as a massive fuel-filled airplane engine slammed into the van dead center with incredible force. We felt the wind of the shock wave as it wrapped around our protective pole. As the ground shook beneath our feet, we pulled each other closer, the intensity of our kiss amplified by the adrenaline provided by our predicament.

Haruhi gave me the biggest smile when our lips finally parted. "Wow! That was amazing! You are an amazing kisser!"

I returned the smile. "Yeah. I experienced some real fireworks myself."

Haruhi wrapped her arms around my neck. "We should do this more often." Then she remembered. "Hey, is that sniper still out there?"

I peeked my head out to the side - and saw a pile of wreckage and burning asphalt where the van had once been. "No he's gone."

I retrieved my bullet hole damaged t-shirt and decided it was a little too messed up to put back on. We walked toward the parking lot and examined the crater and surrounding wreckage that had once been the source of some major aggravation.

"You don't really think that BOOM thing I did just now had anything to do with this, do you?" Haruhi asked.

I gave Haruhi a funny look. "Get serious. People don't just wish for airplane engines to fall out of the sky. It was just a coincidence." I looked up and was pleased to see that the vapor trail made a 180 degree turn. The plane, flying perfectly fine with one less engine, was on the way back to the airport for repairs.

Soon police cars and fire engines pulled up to the scene, as well as the track team and a crowd of other students.

I hugged myself. "I could really use a t-shirt right now."

"Hey bud," Haruhi replied. "You had your chance and you blew it!"

"But we were getting shot at." I kicked the ground. "Damn it!"

"Tell you what." Haruhi started running toward the now-vacant track. "You beat me in a lap around the track and I'll think about it."

That was some pretty good motivation.


End file.
